


Under the Sea

by quirkily



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Curious Keith, Fluff, Gay Keith (Voltron), Insecure Lance (Voltron), Little Mermaid Elements, M/M, Merman Lance, Prince Keith (Voltron), Prince Lance (Voltron), alternate title: keef in the reef, human keith to merman keith, keith faints a lot, medical trained lance, mermaid au, the mystery of how a storm turned keith into a merman
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-27 01:27:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14414673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quirkily/pseuds/quirkily
Summary: Lance is a Prince in a kingdom of merpeople, destined to one day become King and feeling entirely incapable. One day, when he is searching a shallower area of the kingdom during a storm, a young man is seemingly thrown off of a ship by the high winds. When the storm turns the human into a merman, they have to work together to find a way to turn him back, but Lance starts to doubt whether he truly wants Keith to leave.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scarletskies123](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarletskies123/gifts), [burnjeans](https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnjeans/gifts).



> This is a fic written for the Klance Reverse Bang 2018. I worked in a group with [Curiously-Artistic](https://curiously-artistic.tumblr.com/) an amazing artist and [elissigh](http://elissigh.tumblr.com/) an awesome beta and one of the admins for this event. 
> 
> You can find the art that pairs up with this fic [here.](https://curiously-artistic.tumblr.com/post/173247207946/heres-my-part-for-my-groups-klance-reverse-bang)
> 
> I hope you enjoy the fic and art and check out the other incredible projects done for this event!
> 
> You can find more of my writing and support me [here.](https://quirkilyscribbles.tumblr.com/)

Lance is a flurried concoction of emotions. Anger and stress swirl in his gut as he propels himself further and further down towards the seabed. He hated getting lectured by his father. It’s always so uncalled for and unfair. It always confirms every insecure thought Lance had already been thinking. He had been tempted to skip the mer-council meeting altogether, but he had known that would only end with a lecture and that disappointed look in his father’s eye. So he went. And it still ended with a lecture and that disappointed look in his father’s eye.  _ Why did he even bother? _

 

Anger sizzles up into his chest and Lance moves his tail faster, lurching forward and crashing into the seabed and sending up a cloud of sand in his wake. As if the crash had knocked the anger out of him, Lance groans and let his limbs flop down into the sand, making no effort to get up. His father had been right, he had not participated in the meeting at all, had merely sat back and watched the proceedings with a bored look plastered on his face.  _ When I invite you to these meetings it is so that you can have an input on the way this kingdom is being run, _ his father’s angry voice echoed inside his head, _ It is so that you already have the skills for when it is your turn to rule this kingdom one day. And instead, you barely show up and when you do you cannot be bothered to pay attention.  _

 

However, his father had also been wrong. Lance had been paying close attention to every interaction around the table: the way that merpeople higher in the hierarchy were able to interrupt and talk over others, the way mutterings around the table stopped whenever his father chose to contribute, and especially the way his father was constantly analysing everyone around the table, choosing his words carefully and waiting to say them when they would have the most impact. Lance had been busy noticing how completely inept he was compared to everyone else around the table; how pointless any contribution he made would be. Lance sighs. It doesn’t really matter if his father thought he was paying attention or not, his point remains true. Lance was not fit to be King. 

 

Lance slowly pushes himself up and scans the sea around him. He had not known where he was going while he was swimming, but he had instinctively brought himself to the shallow reef on the outskirts of the kingdom. Lance feels the storm in his chest die down as a wave of calm rolls over him.  _ Maybe he’ll be able to find something to add to his collection _ , he muses,  _ that will cheer him up. _ He swims around, scanning the seabed, brushing away the sand with his tail and flicking his hand through seaweed. There are many human objects scattered around this reef. Lance figures that this part of the ocean must have a lot of storms to cause treasure to be lost overboard on human ships up above. 

 

As if hearing his thoughts, a tremor passed through the water around Lance, bobbing him back and forth, thunder echoing down from above. He starts searching through the objects faster, anxious to get back to shelter. He had been trapped in open ocean during a storm before, and, while he isn’t terrified of storms like some merpeople, it isn’t an experience he wishes to repeat. He skims over familiar metal objects with prongs (he has plenty of those) and ignores the sparkly rocks and pearls (they're useless and boring). 

 

Something blue, partly buried in the sand, catches his eye, and he swims over to dig it up. A stronger tremor shakes through him and he sweeps the sand away faster, determined to find out what the object is. It would be near impossible to find the same thing again after this storm rolled through and churned up the seabed. Lance yanks the object free, but it’s lighter than he had anticipated, and his own force sends him flying backwards into a bed of coral. 

 

Lance winces at the hard, sharp surface digging into his torso and pushes himself forwards into the sand. Brushing himself off and hoping the sting in his back is merely a scrape, Lance looks down to the trinket he is holding in his hand. He has just enough time to recognise it as a blue lion sculpture, a human ornament of a human animal, before a massive tremor shoves him forward into the sand and he loses hold of it. Lance scrambles around, trying to find it, but his vision is distorted by sand swirling around him and great flashes of light striking through the water. 

 

Lance grabs ahold of the sculpture and pushes himself up ready to leave when he freezes. The shadow of a ship darkens the reef around him, rocking back and forth as it is tossed around by the storm. Anxious about debris potentially falling on him, Lance runs through routes in his head on how to get back into the kingdom without swimming under the ship. Deciding on a longer but safer route, Lance swims a few feet backwards before being lurched forward into the sand again. When he looks up, he notices a dark silhouette falling rapidly through the water into the reef in front of him. With a jolt, Lance realises that it was the silhouette of a person. Squinting through churning sand, Lance watches as the body continues to sink and hits a bed of coral, disappearing from his sight. 

 

Regaining his senses, Lance tucks the lion sculpture under one arm and tries to sweep away the sand blocking his view and swim over to the human. Lance needs to return them to the surface quickly before they drown, but he is struggling against the water pushing him backwards.  _ Another thing for his father to be annoyed at him for, _ Lance thinks bitterly. He does not like Lance travelling so far to the shallow outskirts of the kingdom because he worries about him running into humans, who do not have a good reputation for being friendly towards merpeople. 

 

However, Lance had never run into any trouble out here, and his father had never gone so far as to stop him, so Lance kept going. Look where that had gotten him. Stuck out here, trying to save the life of some human who would probably freak out at him and be ungrateful anyway. If they are still conscious, that is. Panic bubbles up in Lance’s chest. Suddenly the sea around Lance goes blindingly white, and he shields his eyes from the burning glare. Frozen in horror, Lance watches as a lightning strike moves through the sea, hitting the coral reef not far from where the human had landed. 

 

It was over before Lance had time to truly process what had happened, but he was already rushing towards the coral. It was sizzling, red fumes rising into the water and obscuring Lance’s view worse than the sand had. Hissing as his tail brushed the coral with heat radiating off of it, Lance powers onwards towards where he thinks the human fell. Swimming blindly through the red water, Lance’s tail hits something and he stops. He reaches out, finding hold of an arm and getting ready to drag them up to the surface, hoping he isn’t too late, when the fumes disperse and he can see clearly again. He bumps back into the coral in surprise, staring at the figure laying on the seabed. The silhouette he had seen before had definitely been of a human, but the figure in front of him has the tail of a  _ merperson _ . Lance blinks. This is new. 


	2. Chapter 2

The cave is dim, lit only by some glowing crystals that had been some of the first additions to Lance’s collection. The soft blue and purple glow usually made him feel calm, but with everything else going on, the dark lighting is starting to get on Lance’s nerves. He really should have invested in some coral lamps. 

 

Glancing over at the mysterious former-human but now apparently-merman lying unconscious on his couch, stress tightens further in his stomach, and Lance slams the book he had been looking at shut. Large volumes of books are spread out on the desk in front of him; spell books, medical journals, first aid guides, textbooks, anything that could possibly explain the utterly absurd situation he found himself in. The unconscious boy on his couch is not overly injured, apart from some deep scrapes and cuts that Lance had cleaned and bandaged. Which is a relief, because as much as Lance had been studying medicine over the past few years, he had been teaching himself from textbooks and had never put any of his studies into practice. He isn’t confident in his ability to fix a broken bone just yet. 

 

Irritation bubbles up again in his chest. Lance had never liked fighting and always preferred diplomacy to violence, which would not be an issue if he was any good at diplomatic skills. Instead, he is moderately skilled at long-range attacks and is sure that if his passion was fighting, he would have a professional trainer and received all the royal support he could ask for. Well aware that medicine and healing were not kingly pursuits, he spent his time holed up in this cave with his textbooks and collection of random objects, something else ‘unkingly’ he had to hide about himself. 

 

Sighing and giving up on the scattered mess on his desk, Lance picks up one of the medical salves he had brewed earlier in the week and swims over to the boy on his couch. He carefully unwinds the bandages and starts applying the salve. He hopes the boy will be okay. Lance knows that the trained medical professionals at the castle are far better suited to this, but his cave was the closest place he could get to in the storm, which still had not completely died down. Besides, carrying an unconscious merman into the royal castle would just cause a lot of questions that Lance does not have answers to. 

 

Lance had just finished up applying the salve to the last cut and was in the process of bandaging a scraped arm when a startled face is shoved far too close to his own and a flailing arm is hitting him in his chest. Jerking backwards, Lance panics as he tries to figure out how he could stop the boy from attempting to get up, but the boy flops back down onto the couch in exhaustion before Lance has to do anything. 

 

“Who are you?” The boy demands, a righteous look upon his face, “What have you done to me?”

 

Lance is really not appreciating the boy’s tone, “Carried you out of a storm while you were unconscious?! Cleaned and bandaged your wounds, that’s what I’ve done to you!”

 

At the mention of the storm, the expression on the boy’s face turns into confusion before slowly morphing into concern. He attempts to get up again, muttering something about his crew. When he once again cannot get up, he glares towards the end of the couch as if accusing his own legs of failing him, realises that he no longer has any legs to fail him, and promptly faints. 

 

Lance feels himself relax. He can already tell that explaining what had happened to this boy is going to be an added stress that he had not considered before, and is more than happy to delay it for as long as possible. 

 

~~~

 

Lance sighs and takes a long sip of his seaweed tea before replying, “I can assure you I am not crazy.”

 

The boy, whose name Lance had learned was Keith, shoots him an unconvinced look, “You live in a cave full of junk.”

 

Lance rolls his eyes, “Of course I don’t live here, I live in theー” he suddenly stops. He was going to say ‘castle’, but is not sure that he wants to tell this boy about being the prince. Apart from the fact that it would likely only serve to convince Keith further that he was insane, he was the only person Lance had ever met that did not already know. He had no preconceived ideas about Lance, no expectations of him. “I live in the city like everyone else,” Lance finishes, “This is just my… storage space.”

 

“To store your junk,” Keith concludes.

 

Lance glares at him, “It is not junk. They are my human trinkets.”

 

Keith suddenly looks very alarmed, “From who? Your victims? If you are about to kill me, I can assure you that I have no trinkets on me, it would be much better to let me go.”

 

Lance takes another long sip of his tea, “I have not kidnapped you. You are free to go whenever you wish.”

 

Keith looks unsure on how to respond to this, “I am?”

 

Lance nods, “I thought you might have liked to understand where you are and why you have a mermaid tail, but since you do not believe me anyway, you are quite welcome to go.”

 

“I do not have a mermaid tail.”

 

“You really do.”

 

“You have kidnapped and drugged me, and I am hallucinating.” 

 

“I am quite sure that we have already covered this, but if you insist on me repeating myself: you are a mermaid now. You are not kidnapped. I have not drugged you. You might be hallucinating for all I know, but I see your tail too and I can assure you that I, at least, am not hallucinating.”

 

Keith looks very unimpressed with this answer, “And am I supposed to just believe you?”

 

Lance shakes his head, “Of course not. As I said, you are free to go. I do hope you are a good swimmer though, as we are far away from the shore. But honestly, you are surrounded by water and breathing just fine, so what other proof do you need?” 

 

Keith looks as if he is about to object again before a look of dawning realisation crosses his face, and he starts to move his arms around him, testing out the feel of water surrounding him rather than air. No doubt he had previously attributed the weird pressure to being injured or drugged, Lance muses as he takes another sip of his tea and watches Keith faint once more. 

 

~~~

 

Lance was reading a spell book, deep in thought, when Keith woke up for the third time.

“I would like to apologise,” Keith begins, startling Lance out of his revery.

 

Looking up to give Keith his attention, Lance carefully closes the book and slides it under his chair.

 

“I am usually far more composed than I have been. I was already quite stressed from the storm beating our ship around earlier, and all of this was really quite a lot to take in. I swear I do not panic and collapse at everything that startles me.”

This apology takes Lance completely by surprise, and it takes him a moment to realign the image of the angry boy in denial from before with the one in front of him, who was not only apologising, but also sounding extremely formal. If Lance did not know any better he would have thought Keith was a member of his father’s royal council. 

 

“Thank you for the apology,” Lance grins at him, “But there is really no shame in fainting. Some people are just genetically predisposed to do so.”

 

“I think even those who are not predisposed, such as myself, would likely faint after losing two of their limbs and having it replaced with one!” Keith retorts.

 

“That is very true,” Lance agrees, “Once, maybe, but twice… seems like a common occurrence to me.”

 

Keith shoots Lance an angry glare, and for some odd reason, Lance was glad. He much prefers this angry boy to the one with gentlemanly manners. He lives with gentlemanly manners and royal behaviours. He is sick of them. 

 

“So what happened?” Keith asks. 

 

Lance explains how he saw Keith fall off his ship but how the storm around him had blocked his view while Keith was turned into a mermaid. Keith seems very concerned about his crew aboard the ship until Lance assures him that the ship had not sunk and Keith was the only person he had seen go overboard. 

 

When he stops talking, the cave seems eerily silent for a moment while Keith ponders over everything Lance had said. He was almost afraid that Keith was about to start shouting denial at him once more. Instead, Keith gives one sharp nod and asks, “So what do we do now?”

 

Lance is taken aback by the bluntness of Keith’s question, not expecting him to be so practical about how to fix this problem. Lance is used to being relied on to solve merpeople’s problems throughout the kingdom, and he had not expected Keith to act any differently.

 

“Now, you are going to get some sleep so that your body can heal,” Lance gives Keith a stern look when he notices him about to object, warning him that he will not budge on this matter. 

 

Keith relents, “And once I have arisen in my glorious healthy state? Do you have any idea of what could help me?”

 

Lance subtly adjusts his tail slightly to hide the spellbook under his chair from view, “No, but it will be valuable to inspect the coral reef where it happened, in case the surroundings affected what happened at all. Once the storm has fully passed, of course.”

 

Keith nods, looking satisfied with this plan, “We shall head off tomorrow then.”

 

Once again, even though he knows he shouldn’t be, Lance is taken by surprise at having someone willing to work together with him on something. Even if Keith is only doing it for his own gain. 

 

Lance flashes Keith a smile. “Tomorrow it is.”

 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Lance is exhausted. He had slept terribly, unlike Keith, who had passed out so quickly after lying down that Lance almost thought he had fainted again. Lance spent most of his time in this cave but tried not to sleep here. Something about sleeping away from the castle, far away from the city, with only the sounds of lapping water and fish swimming by, had made Lance feel even more isolated than usual. Not to mention he has no bed here, and since Keith had taken the couch, Lance had decided to do more research and had fallen asleep at the desk. Now he had a crick in his neck, no energy, and a headache that only gets worse with each failed attempt at swimming Keith makes. Lance brings a hand up to his head and rubs his temple, watching as Keith flops down onto the ground. 

 

“No one ever taught you how to swim, huh?”

 

Keith glares up at him, “Of course I know how to swim. It is just a bit more difficult with a dead weight attached to your torso.”

 

Lance bites back a snide remark at this insult to his tail and tries to find his patience. Surely he would not take this long to adjust to having human legs if the situation was reversed. Would he?

 

“Sorry, I didn’t realise that humans swam by doggy paddling and dragging their legs behind them.”

 

Keith does not bother to reply to this and simply pulls himself back up onto the couch and starts waving his arms around in front of him again. Lance turns around to start rummaging through his potions, trying to find one for his headache and giving a deep sigh at the loud thump behind him as Keith hit the floor again. 

 

Lance had really thought they would already be out searching the reef by now. 

 

Giving up on finding a headache remedy, Lance swims over to Keith and grabs his hips. Keith lets out a startled sound and looks at Lance in confusion, face tinged red. 

 

“This,” Lance said, squeezing Keith’s hips, “Is not a ‘dead weight’. You need to learn to swim  _ with _ a tail, not  _ without _ legs, okay?”

 

Keith gives a slight nod. 

 

“Good,” Lance grins, “Try and kick.”

 

Keith just stares at him skeptically. 

 

Lance sighs. “You’re a stubborn one, aren’t you? Just think of it as having your legs joined together, or one really big leg.”

 

Keith makes a sudden jerking movement and runs into Lance, bumping their chests together. He flushes and turns his head away, muttering out, “Sorry.”

 

“No problem, kelp head,” Lance laughs, “Here. I’ll hold you up while you practice kicking. You’ll get the hang of it in no time.”

 

Lance moves his hands up onto Keith’s chest and kicks his tail to propel them higher up into the cave. With a quick, sudden movement, Lance flips Keith sideways so that he is floating horizontal next to Lance. Keith lets out an indignant squawk and flings out an arm to whack Lance in the chest. Lance laughs as he lets go of Keith and moves out of the way, narrowly missing Keith’s fist.

 

“Relax,” Lance smirks, “It’s just so that you can kick without running into me again.”

 

Not that he would mind.

 

Keith is already starting to slowly sink through the water, not making any effort to swim, before Lance shakes his head with a smile and swims back to place his hands under Keith’s chest. 

Lance grins up at Keith, “Off you go then, hotshot. Show me how you swim.”

 

Keith looks away, his dark hair floating through the water and tangling around his face. He puts his hands out to grip onto Lance’s arms to balance himself as he begins to kick in place.

 

This time, Keith wasn’t the only one blushing. 

 

~~~

 

Lance isn’t really sure what Keith was expecting to find out in the reef, but he seems very determined to find it. While Lance had been collecting a sample of the coral bed Keith had landed in, thankful it was no longer burning hot so he could get some without having to use the mysterious pronged tool he’d brought along, Keith had been swimming around the reef scanning the sea floor as if answers would spring out at him. At least he seems to have picked up the swimming fairly quickly, all failed attempts considered. 

 

Securing his last sample in a container, Lance looks up and realises that Keith is nowhere in sight. He tries to reason that the reef is very large and that it’s likely Keith has just gone over a ridge where Lance can’t see over from here, but his heart is still beating quickly in panic. 

 

Frowning, Lance wonders why he cares so much. Keith isn’t his responsibility and if he wants to go and get himself lost, that’s his own fault. Deciding to collect some coral further away that hasn’t been scorched by the lightning for comparison, Lance swims over to another patch of coral and busies himself with collecting a sample. When he looks up, two royal guards are towering over him, one with her arm latched onto Keith. 

 

“Ah,” Lance tries for a reassuring smile, “Hello. Haven’t seen you two in a while, how have you been?”

 

“Oh, alright,” Hunk smiles, “Things have been a bit busy-”

 

Allura shoots him a look and Hunk falls silent, before turning her gaze back to Lance.

 

Lance offers a shaky smile and waits for the impending lecture that will likely rival his father’s. 

 

It does.

 

Allura’s very detailed account of how long he had been missing in terrible storm conditions and how concerned his father was, and how this behaviour was very disappointing for his rank succeeds in making Lance feel bad, but it was Hunk’s quiet “I was worried about you, man,” afterwards that makes him feel well and truly guilty. 

 

He hadn’t even considered that the storm would have gone so far into the city, assuming that it was only on the outskirts of the kingdom. A small part of him is glad that he hadn’t attempted to bring Keith to the castle. There was no way he would’ve been able to swim that far in such conditions. However, the rest of him feels extremely guilty and supposes that he should’ve considered that he had been in his cave for longer than usual even without considering the storm. The thought of him being proclaimed missing hadn’t even occurred to him, he had been so preoccupied with Keith. 

 

“I’m sorry.” Lance mumbles.

 

Allura gives a sharp nod and her attention moves immediately back to Keith. 

 

Before Allura starts to arrest him for whatever she thinks he’s been doing, Lance speaks up, “That’s Keith! I was with him during the storm, that’s why I was missing.”

 

Lance flushes as he realises what  _ that  _ sounds like, but decides not to correct it. He’s already got a reputation for disappearing off with mermen and mermaids, and it’s far easier to let them think that’s what he’s implying then to explain the absurd truth. 

 

Hunk rolls his eyes lightheartedly, and Allura huffs before letting go of Keith. With a warning to avoid going missing in awful weather, the two of them are gone, swimming back to the castle to fulfil their important royal guard duties instead of searching for Lance. He feels another pang of guilt at how long they had been looking for him.

 

Lance looks over at Keith, who is still looking a bit startled and afraid. Allura has that effect on people.

 

Lance is about to crack a joke in an effort to make sure he hadn’t made Keith uncomfortable with what he’d implied, when he freezes. Keith now knows he is the Prince. If having two royal guards looking for you isn’t proof enough, Allura had mentioned it several times during her lecture. 

 

He has no idea what to say. It’s not as if it is a tragic secret that he had kept hidden. They’d hardly known each other for very long, and it was foolish of him to think that Keith wouldn’t find out. Lance supposed that he didn’t think Keith would meet anyone who would tell him before they turned him back into a human. Never mind that everyone knew and anyone Keith would meet could have let it slip somehow. He hadn’t wanted Keith to find out and so he had convinced himself that he wouldn’t. Lance had been utterly naive and now he was lost for words.

 

Luckily, Keith speaks first with a laugh and a grin, “Royal guards, huh? Not any different down here to up on land.”

 

Lance laughs and feels relief rush through him that Keith doesn’t seem at all angry or betrayed, until realisation dawns on him and he stares at Keith sharply, “How much experience do you have with Royal Guards?”

 

Keith glances down and then gives him a sheepish smile, “Quite a lot. You get very used to them when your father is the King and your entire family consists of royalty in some form.”

  
Lance wants to shout  _ ‘trust me, I know,’  _ but he’s entirely more focused on the reality of what Keith is saying: “You’re a Prince too?”


	4. Chapter 4

“Why do you have so many forks?”

 

Lance looks up from his book with an utterly confused look on his face, “What?”

 

“Why do you have so many forks?” Keith repeats as if this will offer some clarity. 

 

Lance is feeling so very lost, “What are forks?”

 

Keith just stares at him as if trying to figure out if he is joking or not. When Lance offers no indication of understanding what Keith is referring to, Keith picks up the tin of metal objects next to him and swims over to rattle them in Lance’s face. 

 

“Oh, those.” Lance nods and leans back in his chair with a proud smirk, “Those are my dinglehoppers.”

 

Keith looks completely baffled, “What? No. No, they’re not. They’re forks. How do you not know what forks are?”

 

Lance just shakes his head, “No, they’re dinglehoppers. They’re very helpful, I use them for making my potions and medical salves. Good for mixing and stabbing the ingredients and materials.”

 

“They’re meant for eating,” Keith stares at Lance, “You use them with knives to eat food.”

 

Keith is only succeeding in confusing Lance further, “Knives are weapons though. Do you eat with weapons? Are dinglehoppers weapons too? I suppose they are quite pointy. Seems quite violent if you ask me.”

 

Keith just shakes his head in frustration, “No. Yes. I mean. Knives are weapons, but we use different knives for eating. Or, I suppose they aren’t much different really, but that’s not the point. This is called a fork, and it is used for eating and not fighting.” Keith starts to observe the fork in a different light, “Well I suppose you could use one for fighting… not as sharp as a knife, but they are rather pointy.”

 

Lance hums in consideration, “I still prefer dinglehopper.”

 

Keith just rolls his eyes, “Where do you get all this stuff anyway?”

 

“Out in the reef where I found you,” Lance grins cheekily, “Does that make you part of my collection as well?”

 

Keith glares at him, “Would you like me to test out how good these forks are for stabbing?”

 

Lance just laughs as Keith sighs and swims away to put the tin back on the shelf. Lance watches as Keith rifles through his collection, occasionally calling out a name and purpose. Lance entirely rejects all of this and informs Keith of the objects’ better names and purposes. 

 

Keith stops when he reaches something he finds more interesting than the other things he’s rifled through, looking over his shoulder at Lance, “A clock?”

 

“Hmm?” Lance swims over to see what Keith is looking at. “Oh, that’s my quiznak.”

 

Keith lets out an involuntary laugh. “How do you come up with these ridiculous names?”

 

Lance takes a mock offended gasp and slaps a hand on his chest. “You wound me!”

The two boys break out into hysterical laughter before Lance shrugs and answers, “I don’t know, I guess it’s fun to be silly about something. Now tell me, how to you use quiznaks up on the land above?”

 

Keith smiles, “We use clocks to tell the time.”

 

Lance looks kind of shocked and confused and Keith shoots him a rye look, “What, you don’t have a concept of time?”

 

Lance gives a small smile and shakes his head, “No, that’s not it. It’s just that I’ve been using it to tell the time as well.”

 

Keith shoots him a deadpan look, “You know how to read a clock but you have no idea what forks are.”

 

Lance grins again, “We measure time in ticks, and the quiznak made a ticking sound so I figured,” Lance shrugged, “It made sense.”

 

Keith just shakes his head and starts rummaging through Lance’s collection again, “No. No, it does not. None of this makes any sense at all.”

 

Lance’s heart feels light in his chest, but his stomach clenches with something else, and as he watches Keith move around the cave, he can’t help but agree with him. 

 

~~~

 

The days pass. Lance spends most of his time slouched at his desk, poring over his textbooks and scribbling down notes and drawings of corals. He’d learnt a lot about coral over the past few days. 

 

He had also learnt that Keith was extremely impatient. 

  
  


At first, he had wanted to help, hovering around Lance and asking if he could bring him anything. That hadn’t lasted very long once it became apparent that Keith had no knowledge of any of the plant samples he asked for, and Lance had so many piles of books scattered around that he didn’t blame Keith for taking so long to find the ones he was looking for. 

 

When Keith realised that he couldn't really do anything and just had to wait for Lance, he started sulking. Lance had never seen anyone sulk because they didn’t have any work to do, but Keith was a mystery all on his own. 

 

After the sulking came the questions. The questions were the worst. 

 

Lance knows Keith just wants to go into the kingdom and see how it compares to his own kingdom back at home. But Lance is determined to complete his research and truthfully, he doesn’t feel like going back to the castle anytime soon. Keith knows he would only get lost if he tried to go by himself, so he resorts to pestering Lance with questions about how a kingdom of merpeople compares to a kingdom of humans. 

 

Lance is glad that Keith had stopped being angry about becoming a mermaid and, as a curious person himself, Lance appreciates Keith’s curiosity. He’d indulged Keith at first, reminding himself that even though the answers about the kingdom and merpeople were obvious to him, they were fascinating and new to Keith. They hadn’t talked much at all about both of them being royalty. Questions remained formal and about each other’s kingdom. Nothing personal. Nothing about why Lance was holed up in a cave so far away from everyone else. Nothing about why Keith had been in the middle of the sea on a boat that Lance knew hadn’t been royal.

 

It wasn’t really like Keith was pestering him. The questions are very spread out, interjected between laps of the cave wherein Keith would choose an object to stare at as if he hadn’t already stared at it several times, flop down onto the couch and flick through one of Lance’s many books, re-order Lance’s shelves of potions, or any other combination of meaningless tasks he could come up with.

 

Lance knows he usually talks in massive amounts and he has no right to be annoyed at Keith for asking some questions. But the way Keith is so obviously bored, the way that they are both so obviously skirting around the questions they actually want to ask, and the way that Lance’s mind keeps drifting back to how disappointed his father will be when he finally ventures back to the castle to explain everything, it all just makes the tension build up further and further. And when Keith finally asks, “So why do you have so many spell books down here?” Lance snaps.

 

“Because maybe I’ve been looking for a way to turn a merman into a human for a while now!” Lance yells, pushing himself up off his desk and knocking a few of his books onto the ground. “Maybe I’m actually pretty shit at being a Prince, and maybe I figured that the best plan for everyone would be to run away, and maybe I figured that becoming a human was the best way to do that, so maybe I went out and bought all of the spells books that I could find!”

Lance’s chest is heaving, and he stares at Keith as he struggles to breathe, feeling his anger slowly disappear, shame and melancholy replacing it. Great. He’d just dumped his deepest insecurities onto a guy he’d known for less than a week.

 

Instead of yelling back at him, or slowly swimming away with a judgemental look, or any other horrible reaction that Lance could imagine, Keith swims over to Lance and wraps him in a hug. Lance is a hug person. He hadn’t thought Keith would be a hug person, but if the guy wants to offer comfort by cradling Lance in his arms, he’s not about to complain.

 

The hug works. Lance instantly feels better. The two boys just float there, arms wrapped around each other, all thoughts of becoming human erased from their minds.That is, until Keith pulls away and swims down to the floor of the cave, picking up one of the spellbooks that had fallen off and showing Lance the open page, “Lance, look.”

 

Lance’s gut clenches. It was about making a potion to turn a merperson into a human. He’d pored over that page for countless hours, written endless notes, and could probably recite the ingredients off by heart.

 

“Oh,” Lance says quietly, a lump in his throat, “That looks promising. I don’t know how I missed that one, but I’ll have a further look for you.” 

 

And with the bitter taste of a lie on his tongue, Lance takes the book from Keith and swims back over to the desk, turning his back on him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is all I have so far but the last two chapters will be up before the end of the month!!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is unbeta'd so if the spelling/grammar/overall neatness is lower quality than previous chapters, that is why :)

Lance is feeling guilty. He hates lying. He knows he should tell Keith the truth.

 

The truth being, of course, that he has known about the potion all along. That the potion is his escape plan, his way of avoiding becoming King and failing the kingdom. 

The truth being, of course, that through his time-consuming research he learnt that what had happened to Keith was the result of a spell caused by a chemical reaction when the lightning hit the coral. 

The truth being, of course, that the results of this spell are temporary. Keith will turn back into a human all on his own, without any assistance from Lance, without any potion or spell.

 

He should really tell Keith. 

 

He considers it while Keith swims excitedly around the cave, checking which ingredients Lance already has and which ones they need to buy. 

 

He can’t tell Keith. 

 

He tries to convince himself that it’s because Keith looks the happiest he’s ever seen him since they met, excited to go into the city and buy things from the markets, and telling Keith that they don’t really need to go to the markets would only dampen his mood. 

 

It sounds hollow even to him and he swallows down the bitter taste of selfishness. 

 

Keith looks up from the list of ingredients Lance had given him, “Okay, I’ve crossed out all of the ones you already have.”

 

Lance plasters a grin on to his face, “Took you long enough. Come on, let’s go.”

 

The swim into the Kingdom’s city centre takes far longer than Lance had anticipated, for one sole reason: Keith. It turns out Keith is not just curious about the markets and the city, he is apparently curious about  _ everything _ . 

 

Lance tries to be patient, he really does, but he struggles to understand why Keith feels the need to inspect every different type of coral they come across and scare off every fish they meet with his inquisitive stare. Not to mention the way he is swimming: up towards the surface as high as he dares, swooping down to the bottom, swimming circles around Lance and then darting off somewhere else again. 

 

Lance had already been a jumble of nerves, not just from lying, but from the meeting he has with his father this afternoon that is floating at the forefront of his mind and making him anxious. Keith’s fast darting around is just making everything worse.

 

He reminds himself that even though to him, his surroundings are the ones he has grown up with and wants to leave behind, to Keith, this is a whole new world. If he was in Keith’s place, up in the human world, he’d probably be acting the exact same way. Hell, he’d probably be worse.

So he rolls his eyes at Keith in fond annoyance every time he swims back next to him, and gives him small smiles in response to Keith’s excited grins, and eventually, they reach the markets.

 

Lance expects Keith to become even more obnoxiously excited when they reach the city centre, but instead, as soon as they become immersed in the noisy bustle of merpeople shopping and going about their day, Keith falls silent and becomes still at Lance’s side. 

 

Lance glances over at Keith in concern, but even though Keith’s face has become a little guarded, predominantly he is just staring around in awe. 

 

“As awesome as you expected?” Lance smirks. 

 

“Better,” Keith breathes out and the arrogance slips off Lance’s face.

 

For a moment, he can see the market reflected in Keith’s eyes, and he’s not sure which is more beautiful: Keith, or the kingdom he has come to resent. 

 

The moment passes. The pressure and responsibility weighing down his shoulders remind him why they are there, and he plasters a grin back onto his face, “We should find most of our ingredients at the stall over there.”

 

He nudges Keith forward towards the stall. Pulled out of his revery, Keith smiles over at Lance before beginning to swim towards a pink-haired mermaid waving shells and fruits in the air. 

Lance’s heart aches inside his ribs, and he realises that he will miss Keith once he is gone. 

 

~~~

 

Lance feels sick with nerves. 

 

He knows his father will be angry with him. Not genuinely angry, just angry in that parental  _ “I care too much and worry about you, and therefore I will shout at you,” _ way. Knowing that the anger comes from a place of love and concern has never made him feel better about the shouting though, and Lance doubts that this time will be any different. 

 

The guard stationed outside the castle’s meeting room gestures for Lance to enter. He takes a deep steadying breathe that does nothing to calm his nausea, opens the door carefully, and swims inside. 

 

The room is deathly silent.

 

Lance waits patiently for his father to say something, or let out a disappointed sigh, anything to indicate that he has noticed Lance’s presence. Instead, he slowly looks up from his large shell-ornamented desk, and gestures for Lance to take a seat across from him. 

 

Lance swims over and sits down cautiously, trying to figure out what his father is thinking. The room is noticeably lacking tension, and his father is not frowning at all. In fact… it almost looks like he’s smiling? If his father is not angry with him, Lance has no idea why he was summoned into a meeting. 

 

“You wanted to see me?” Lance prompts.  

 

His father nods slowly and stares at Lance as if he can see right into his soul and find the information he’s looking for. 

 

He’s starting to think his father is angry after all. 

 

“I have been informed that you were seen in the reef with another merman,” the king of the merpeople declares.

 

Lance has no idea where this is going. Is he going to be warned away from the reef again? He thought they were past that. 

 

“Yes,” Lance agrees. 

 

“This merman you were with,” Lance’s father raises an eyebrow, “He was not recognised by my official guards, and they are quite familiar with the people of this kingdom.”

 

In other words, Lance had failed to convince Allura of Keith’s identity and succeeded in making her suspicious. 

 

“Ah,” Lance nods and then realises he has no idea what to say.

 

“Would you care to tell me who he is?”

 

Lance really  _ doesn’t _ care to tell his father who Keith is, but he doubts that answer would go down well. Instead, he stares determinedly at his tail and tries to come up with a believable explanation. 

 

He can feel his father’s stare drilling into him. The silence is threatening, audible proof of Lance’s failure to find any words to say. His father clears his throat and Lance blurts, “He’s a human.”

 

That was not what Lance had been planning to say. It was also clearly not what his father had expected him to say, as the paternal knowing look he had been wearing completely disappears. 

 

“That’s not… what I had been told,” Lance doesn’t see his father look confused very often, and he is tempted to savour the moment. 

 

Instead, he takes a deep breath and launches into an explanation. Lance focuses on one of the shelves behind his father so that he can’t tell what his father is thinking. Any odd look in response and he is likely to lose his train of thought and stop speaking altogether. 

 

Lance stumbles through an explanation of what the storm did to Keith without admitting how much he knows. He doesn’t want to have to explain why he’s been researching and making a potion to turn Keith human if Keith will supposedly turn human anyway. If Lance sounds stilted or awkward, his father doesn’t comment on it. 

 

He’s surprised to find that he feels relieved after confiding in his father; as if the secret around Keith had been weighing on him more than he had realised.

 

His father contemplates Lance’s words before responding, “This seems like a good opportunity to improve our relationship with the human kingdoms. Or at least, to gain more human information.”

 

Lance wasn’t exactly expecting his father to react  _ badly _ , but he certainly wasn’t expecting him to act so  _ relaxedly _ , either. It almost seems as if he isn’t at all surprised that a human could turn into a merman so easily, but Lance supposes he has seen a lot of weird things in his time as King. 

 

Lance is so confused by his father’s calm exterior that it takes him a while to process what he had said, “What do you mean?” 

 

“Well, you said Keith was a prince?”

 

Lance nods.

 

“Hosting a human prince in our kingdom, assisting him, and introducing him to our customs is the perfect opportunity to form an alliance of kingdoms,” he gives Lance a sly look, “perhaps even a marriage alliance…” 

 

Lance feels his face turn red and wonders how much of their encounter Allura repeated to his father.

 

“I’m not sure,” Lance stutters, “I mean, how would that even work? Keith wants to go back to his human kingdom.”

 

Lance may as well have added  _ ‘otherwise I’d absolutely love to marry him!’  _ for the look his father gives him. 

 

“Well, our kingdom has invented many potions for temporary transformation into a human or merman,” his father explains formally, but is giving Lance a big amused grin, “they were originally designed for visits concerning political matters, but could also be used for romantic visits or even sexu-”

 

“Wow! Thanks, Dad, see you later,” Lance stumbles as his tail hits the chair in his haste to leave. 

 

As he carefully shuts the door and nods to the guard, it occurs to Lance that he could have saved a lot of time researching and collecting ingredients if he had simply gone to his father for help. 

 

He hesitates, ignoring the odd look he’s getting from the guard. 

 

If he swims back in there, swallows his embarrassment, and asks for one of those potions he could save a lot more time not needing to brew one. 

 

Lance shakes his head, gives the guard an awkward smile, and continues swimming away from the meeting room.

 

There’s no way Lance can stand any more embarrassing comments from his father. And asking for his father’s help has too many risks. What if his father found out that Keith didn’t need the potion at all? What if he figured out Lance’s plan and tried to stop him?

 

And hey, spending more time with Keith doesn’t sound too bad either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been so long between updates that I've had a joke for this end note planned out for months. It went something like this:
> 
> Me at the end of last chapter: wow im on holidays so ill definitely have this ENTIRE fic done by the end of april!! which is less than a week away!!  
> Me now: so hey y'all, happy may/june/july/august/every month after that which i did not update etc
> 
> However, now the joke goes something more like:
> 
> Me now: wow so I'm still on holidays, and it's still pretty close to april, the month I said I would update!!  
> Oh, no, not april 2018 when i last updated, ... It's 2019 now... april is only a few months away! I'm updating before the end of april!!....this counts right??
> 
> its been 9 months. NINE MONTHS. 
> 
> so see you again april 2020???


End file.
